Gabe and I had come to several conclusions about co-sleeping, night nursing, and sleep in general. We felt like night weaning was necessary, but we didn’t want to make any changes before our cruise in May. We decided to take on the challenge during the first free weekend that we had after the cruise.
After several weeks of the new routine, things are looking quite promising. If you’re a regular reader, you should be well aware that Maddie is not the best sleeper. Up until recently, I have pretty much posted as a separate post each time that she has slept more than 6 hours in the past year! Let’s just say that these posts have in no way cluttered up the blog.
The first week of night weaning was rough. I had done quite a bit of reading on the subject, and one of the suggestions is to remove Mommy from the nighttime equation. Dr. Sears was one who makes this recommendation. So, I slept on the couch for that first week (and maybe almost one more week after that).
The first night involved quite a bit of loud crying when she awoke as usual at 11pm. We weren’t going to fight the co-sleeping battle at the same time (not to mention that the co-sleeping isn’t an issue exactly…the NOT sleeping is our issue. The constant nursing has recently been a bit of a problem as well.). Gabe would bring Maddie to the bed as usual, but I was unavailable. Maddie was not thrilled about this, and she cried and cried for Mommy. It was difficult for all of us since I was not far away in the other room. Gabe was finally able to get her back to sleep, and she woke several times throughout the night looking for me and crying about it. I joined the family in the bed at around 6am, which is a suitable time for nursing. Maddie nursed quite a bit at this point.
The next night, I was on the couch again and Maddie cried a little less when Daddy brought her to bed. I had my first night terror in a LONG time and was convinced that the couch was an unsafe place to continue my night (I couldn’t convince myself that the big spider that I saw wasn’t in my imagination, though I’m almost sure that it was). I went to the bed, and a little while later I had another night terror. This time I was pretty sure that the same (or similar) spider crawled over Maddie onto Gabe. I have no idea how I was able to convince myself that it was a night terror and my imagination and NOT REAL. But I did, despite the fact that I thought it entirely possible that the spider had gotten trapped in my hair and followed me to the bed. I tried to push that thought away in my head and went back to sleep.
Maddie woke up several times, and it was rough to deny her requests to nurse. She cried a lot. I tried to comfort her in other ways. I told her that we would nurse when the sun comes up. I held her off until the light came through the windows. Things went a lot smoother when I was on the couch. She was upset the previous night, but not as upset as she was when I was there and I denied her requests to nurse! Oh, and on top of the two night terrors, I dreamed that the whole family was in a plane crash (fortunately, we somehow survived as we crashed on water and we were trying to figure out how to get off of the plane and into the rafts). Can you say stressful!?
Maddie nursed a lot at 6am, and she also nursed more than usual during the day on both Saturday and Sunday (we started on Friday night).
The third night, Gabe and I went to a movie while Aunt Kristin babysat. We were shocked when we came home and found Kristin in the living room without Maddie! When Kristin took her to her room, Maddie requested to be put in the crib. Kristin patted Maddie for a few minutes, and she went to sleep. We were even more shocked when she didn’t wake for almost 6 hours!!! She had not done that in ages. I slept on the couch, and Maddie didn’t even cry when Gabe took her to the bed. We were starting to see definite progress, but we weren’t ready to get our hopes up just yet. Once again, I joined the bed at 6am and Maddie nursed a lot.
We encountered some setbacks over the next few nights as our efforts were poorly timed. She FINALLY cut her 3rd tooth and seems like she may be getting the 4th at any moment. A few nights were rough due to the teething, presumably.
After those few awful days, we got into a routine. Maddie was fairly easily soothed by Daddy when waking up and coming to the bed. At first, she woke up in the crib and was ready for our bed around the same time as usual, shortly before midnight. She threw in a few 5 and 6 hour stretches for good measure and even a few 7 hour stretches. Things have certainly been improving. About two weeks into the night weaning, she slept a miraculous 10 hours straight! She has not repeated this feat, but we finally have hope.
Aside from last week’s midweek fever and ear infection (awful, awful nights), her worst nights have involved a 5 hour stretch of sleep. This may not sound like much to many of you, but for Maddie this is huge. She’s added more 7 hour stretches to her record. Sometimes, we have to go upstairs and pat her once or twice to get her back to sleep, but this was something that wasn’t even possible two months ago. Usually if she woke up, she would not accept any answer except “take me to your bed.” Attempting to pat her back to sleep and get her back into the crib resulted in a Maddie who wanted to stay awake for two hours. It typically wasn’t worth the risk.
She has been difficult to get to sleep initially on many nights. For example, as I am writing this Gabe is upstairs putting Maddie to bed, and she is protesting (I’ll likely schedule this to post on a different day as I usually do!). She’s very tired and needs her sleep, but she fights it very hard!
She doesn’t ask to nurse when she gets into the bed, and I’m able to sleep in my bed all night (hooray!). She sometimes wants to be very, very close to me (even laying on my chest like she did when she was a newborn), especially when she’s sick. Other times, she doesn’t even seem to know that I’m there! I’m not complaining one bit about the co-sleeping. I know I’ll miss it when she sleeps the entire night in her crib, but I’m not going to complain either. For now, I’m happy to get some extra sleep and my morning snuggles. It’s a very sweet compromise.